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Ulysses (poem)

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"Ulysses" is a poem by Alfred, Lord Tennyson (1809–1892), the noted Victorian poet; it was published in his second collection of Poems in 1842. In the poem, Ulysses describes his discontent and restlessness after returning to his kingdom; he yearns to explore again, despite his long-desired reunion with his wife Penelope and his son Telemachus.[1]

Many authors, such as Dante and Shakespeare, have written about Ulysses since the character first appeared in the Iliad and Odyssey (c. 800–600 BC). Tennyson's Ulysses resembles Dante's, who is condemned to hell for his zealous pursuit of knowledge at others' expense.

For most of the poem's history, a straightforward reading of its themes prevailed; the heroic, resolute Ulysses was admired for his determination "to strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield".[2] This, the poem's last line, has become a popular quotation. Scholars have since offered more nuanced interpretations of the poem, arguing, for example, that the poem contains important ironies.

Structure and synopsis

"Ulysses"'s 70 lines of blank verse are presented as a dramatic monologue; the poem's forceful and unadorned language expresses Ulysses' conflicting moods in iambic pentameter. The use of spondees and pyrrhics interrupts the insistent meter, and the many enjambed lines in the monologue hint at Ulysses' restlessness.

Unlike many of Tennyson's other important poems, "Ulysses" was not revised after its publication. It has, however, been printed with both three and four paragraphs. With three paragraphs, the poem is divided at lines 33 and 44; with four, the five-line introduction becomes its own movement. Tennyson originally blocked out the poem in four paragraphs, a structure that affects the analysis of Ulysses' narration. In the four-movement version, the first and third are thematically parallel, but may be read as interior and exterior monologues, respectively.[3]

The first paragraph introduces Ulysses to the reader. He has returned to his kingdom of Ithaca after fighting in the Trojan War and his long, eventful journey home. The narrative context is mentioned only indirectly in the poem, but originates in Homer's Iliad and Odyssey. Ulysses describes his lack of contentment with domestic life, including his alienation from the "savage race" that he governs. Ulysses seems to carefully choose his tone to reinforce his sophistication and rank.[4]

Odysseus (the same character, in Greek[5])

  • p2
  • p3
  • p4

Biographical context

 
Alfred, Lord Tennyson.

Tennyson penned "Ulysses" after the death of his close Cambridge friend, Arthur Henry Hallam (1811–1833), a friendship he considered glamorous and glorious. The two friends had spent much time discussing the nature of poetry and truth and writing verse together. Together they traveled to southern France, the Pyrenees, Germany and Spain. Many thought that Hallam, a gifted young poet, was destined for greatness, perhaps as a statesman.[6]

When he heard on October 1, 1833 of his friend's death, Tennyson was living in Somersby, Lincolnshire, in close quarters with his mother and nine of his ten siblings. His father had died in 1831, requiring Tennyson to move home and take responsibility for the family. Tennyson's friends became increasingly concerned about his mental and physical health during this time. The family had little income, and two of Tennyson's brothers were mentally ill. As Tennyson's outlook was improving—he was adjusting to his new domestic duties, regaining contact with friends, and had published his 1832 book of poems—the news of Hallam's death arrived. Tennyson shared his grief with his sister, Emily, who had lost her fiance.

The emotional gulf between the state of his domestic affairs and the loss of his special friendship informs the reading of "Ulysses"—particularly its treatment of domesticity.[7] At one moment, Ulysses' discontent seems to mirror Tennyson's, who would have been frustrated with managing the house in such a state of grief. At the next, Ulysses is determined to transcend his age and his environment by traveling again. Tennyson said that the poem "gave my feeling about the need of going forward and braving the struggle of life".[8] It may be that Ulysses' determination to defy circumstance attracted Tennyson to the myth.[9] "There is more about myself in Ulysses, which was written under the sense of loss and that all had gone by, but that still life must be fought out to the end. It was more written with the feeling of [Hallam's] loss upon me than many poems in In Memoriam."[10] Tennyson memorialized Hallam in another of his most highly regarded poems, In Memoriam A.H.H., completed seventeen years later.

Interpretations

Literary context

 
One of William Blake's watercolors illustrating Dante's Inferno; here, Ulysses and Diomedes are condemned to hell.

Many poets wrote about Ulysses, among them Homer, Euripides, Horace, Dante, William Shakespeare, and Alexander Pope. Tennyson's poem, considered the first modern account of Ulysses, influenced James Joyce's novel Ulysses and Ezra Pound's poem The Cantos.[11]

The varied moods and the ambiguity of "Ulysses" challenge interpretation, according to W. B. Stanford, who surveyed Ulysses in literature.[12] Tennyson adopts aspects of the Ulysses character from many sources. Homer's Odyssey provides the narrative scenery, but Tennyson's Ulysses is not the lover of public affairs of Homer's poems. Rather, Dante is Tennyson's main model for Ulysses.[13] Dante's Inferno tells the story of a Ulisse condemned to the eighth circle of hell for using his gift of reason for evil. To Dante, Ulysses, with his "zeal…/T'explore the world", is an evil counselor who lusts for adventure at the expense of his family and his duties in Ithaca.[14] Tennyson adapts this "zeal" into Ulysses' unquenched desire for knowledge:[15]

     And this gray spirit yearning in desire
     To follow knowledge like a sinking star,
     Beyond the utmost bound of human thought.

The influence of Shakespeare appears momentarily in the early movement. The savage race "that hoard, and sleep, and feed, and know not me" echoes Hamlet's soliloquy: "What is a man, / If his chief good and market of his time / Be but to sleep and feed? A beast, no more."[16] Ulysses is a character in Shakespeare's Troilus and Cressida. Tennyson's "How dull it is pause, to make an end, / to rust unburnish’d, not to shine in use!" recalls Shakespeare's character:[17]

                  perserverance, my dear lord,
     Keeps honour bright: to have done is to hang
     Quite out of fashion, like a rusty mail,
     In monumental mockery.

The decisive influence of Dante is asserted with the arrival of the last movement, according to Stanford. Ulysses turns his attention first to himself and then to the cause of his restlessness. He speaks now of ports, broad seas, and his mariners. Calling his men to join him on one last adventure, he recalls the last words of Dante's Ulisse. The strain of discontent and weakness in old age never leaves the poem, but Tennyson leaves Ulysses to "strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield", recalling the Dantesque infernal desire for knowledge. This modern Ulysses looks toward a new age of scientific optimism and colonialism.[18]

According to Rowlinson (1994), "Ulysses" is an argument for continuation of narrative in a textual tradition, and a "meditation on the ground of that continuity".[19] Tennyson asserts the inseparability of Ulysses, the person, with his name. Ulysses says, "I am become a name…I am a part of all that I have met" in successive sentences and in parallel clauses. He speaks in the fictional time of Homer’s Ulysses, but his claim is also that of Tennyson’s text, existing in another temporal order, and therefore refers to his fame extending from the Homeric and other works about him.

Ulysses as narrator

The degree to which Tennyson identifies with Ulysses has been one of the great debates among scholars of the poem.[20] If Tennyson endorses the speaker, the speech may be read without irony; if the poet departs from this identification, alternative readings avail themselves. Tennyson asserted that his monologues should not be read as autobiographies,[21] but critics have still examined "Ulysses" for signs of its author. Until the early twentieth century, readers reacted to the poem affirmatively—that is, without ironic interpretation. The poem became more controversial as Tennyson's stature rose.[22]

Key to the straightforward reading of "Ulysses" is the biographical context of the poem. Such a reading takes into account Tennyson's statements about writing the poem, and considers that he would not undermine Ulysses' determination with irony when he needed such a stalwartness to continue in the face of Hallam's death.[23]

After Paull F. Baum argued in 1948 that Ulysses recalls Milton's Satan,[24] the weight of ironic interpretation increased. Ulysses' apparent disdain for those around him is one facet of the ironic perspective. Ulysses declares that he is "matched with an aged wife"; indicates his weariness in governing a "savage race"; and suggests his philosophical distance from his son Telemachus. A stronger reading of the second movement finds it a condescending tribute to Telemachus and a rejection of his "slow prudence". However, the adjectives used to describe Telemachus—"blameless", "discerning", and "decent"—are words with positive connotations in other of Tennyson's poetry and within the classical tradition.[25]

Chiasson argued in 1954 that Tennyson was affirming the need for faith by showing how Ulysses' lack left him unheedful of the need to keep order in his kingdom and in his own life. He found the poem "intractable" in Tennyson's canon—its interpretation being something of a sport—but the poem resolves itself when its "method of indirection" is understood. Ulysses is scornful—like Tennyson's Tithonus and the mariners of "The Lotos-Eaters"—and he illustrates Tennyson's conviction that "disregarding religious sanctions and 'submitting all things to desire' leads to either a sybaritic or a brutal repudiation of responsibility and 'life'."[26]

Other ironic readings have related Ulysses to Byronic heroes such as Childe Harold, or found him longing for withdrawal, even death, in the form of his proposed quest. In the Homeric narrative, Ulysses' mariners, whom he calls on—"Come, my friends, / 'Tis not too late to seek a newer world"—are dead, a fact that encourages psychological readings.

The dramatic monologue

Scholars disagree about how "Ulysses" functions as a dramatic monologue; it is not necessarily clear to whom Ulysses is speaking, if anyone, and from what ___location. Some see the verse turning from a soliloquy to a public address. Ulysses seems to speak to himself in the first two movements, then to turn to an audience as he introduces his son, then to relocate to the seashore where he addresses his "mariners".[27] In this analysis, the comparatively direct and honest language of the first two movements is set against the more affirmative tone of the last two movements. Comparing Ulysses' two musings on domestic life in Ithaca, the second paragraph about Telemachus is a "revised version [of the first movement] for public consumption".[28]

Opposing the archetype of Ulysses as adventurer is the sense of passivity found in "Ulysses" and other of Tennyson's poetry. T. S. Eliot opined that "Tennyson could not tell a story at all". To him, Dante's treatment of Ulysses is an exciting narrative, while Tennyson's piece is "only…an elegiac mood".[29] "Ulysses" is not a narrative of action; the king's goal is vague, and by the poem's famous last line, it is not clear what he is "striving" for, or to what he refuses to "yield". To Ulysses, "all experience" is "somewhere out there",[30] "an arch wherethrough / Gleams that untravelled world whose margin fades / Forever and forever when I move." According to Tucker (1983), Tennyson’s characters "move" through time and space to be moved inwardly. The senses of desire and vague movement in "Ulysses" reinforce the etymological connection between "passion" and "passivity".

Legacy and references in art

Rise in the canon

The contemporary reviews of Tennyson's 1842 volume of Poems were positive. That year, author John Sterling (a member of the Cambridge Apostles along with Tennyson) wrote of "Ulysses", "There is in this work a delightful epic tone, and a clear impassioned wisdom quietly carving its sage words and graceful figures on pale but lasting marble."[31] Scottish writer Thomas Carlyle appreciated the poem, but goaded Tennyson to apply Ulysses' convictions to his own life. Richard Holt Hutton summarized "Ulysses" as "[Tennyson's] friendly picture of the insatiable craving for new experience, enterprise, and adventure, when under the control of a luminous reason and a self-controlled will."[32] The contemporary reviews found no hint of irony in the poem. Storch (1971) examined how Victorian culture shaped the era's response to the poem's two conflicting themes of domestic servitude and individualism. He concluded that the Victorian era's moral sensibility "moved along other lines", such that Ulysses' rejection of family and society did not produce a moral conflict for the reader.

"Ulysses" was well-received, but its rise within the Tennyson canon was not immediate. Reviewing the history of its publication in anthologies, Rowlinson (1992) observed that "Ulysses" was not usually among the poems Tennyson selected for his public readership. In teaching anthologies, however, the poem was usually included. The ultimate prominence of "Ulysses" in Tennyson's canon was postulated the result of two trends that considerably postdated its first publication: the rise of formal English poetry studies, and the nineteenth-century effort to define English culture as a system of values that could be exported abroad.[33] Though "Ulysses" offers no overt imperialism (the word did not appear in English until 1851), some of Tennyson's later poetry did argue for the value of Britain's colonies. His epilogue "To the Queen" (1873) in Idylls of the King is in this vein.[34]

The twentieth century brought with it a skepticism of Ulysses as narrator and a willingness to explore meaning beyond the author's intention. Still, "Ulysses" remains a much-admired poem.[35] Professor of literature Basil Willey said of "Ulysses" in 1956, "In 'Ulysses' the sense that he must press on and not moulder in idleness is expressed objectively, through the classical story, and not subjectively as his own experience. He comes here as near perfection in the grand manner as he ever did; the poem is flawless in tone from beginning to end; spare, grave, free from excessive decoration, and full of firmly controlled feeling."[36] W. W. Robson and others have found stylistic incongruities between the poem and poet: "Tennyson, the responsible social being, the admirably serious and 'committed' individual, is uttering strenuous sentiments in the accent of Tennyson the most un-strenuous, lonely and poignant of poets."[37]

In poetry

In a 1929 essay, T. S. Eliot called "Ulysses" a "perfect poem",[38] while noting that Tennyson's achievement is the result of "forcing". An analogue of Ulysses is found in Eliot's "Gerontion" (1920)[39] Both poems are narrated by an aged man contemplating life's end. Comparing "Ulysses"' introductory lines, Eliot's comment on Ulysses is ironic:

     Rocks, moss, stonecrop, iron, merds.
     The woman keeps the kitchen, makes tea,
     Sneezes at evening, poking the peevish gutter.

                 I am an old man,
     A dull head among windy places. (12–16)

Italian poet Giovanni Pascoli (1855-1912) stated that his long lyric poem L'ultimo viaggio was an attempt to reconcile the portrayals of Ulysses in Dante and Tennyson with the prophecy that Ulysses would die "a mild death off the sea."[40] Ulysses leaves Ithaca to retrace his epic voyage rather than begin another. Arturo Graf (1848–1913), a contemporary of Pascoli, wrote "L'ultimo viaggio di Ulisse" with the more familiar echo of Dante's heroic character.

Other references

Many readers have accepted the acclaimed last lines of the poem as inspirational, despite other interpretations which question Ulysses' bravery:

     One equal temper of heroic hearts,
     Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will
     To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.

Antarctic explorer Robert Falcon Scott and his party died on their return voyage from the South Pole in 1912. A cross memorializing them on Observation Hill is inscribed with "Ulysses"' last line. In the series finale of the television sitcom Frasier, entitled "Goodnight, Seattle", psychiatrist Frasier Crane quotes the end of the poem in his farewell speech.

Notes

  1. ^ Tennyson, A. T., & Day, A. (1991), 360.
  2. ^ Pettigrew, 28.
  3. ^ Pettigrew, 41.
  4. ^ Campbell, 132.
  5. ^ The word "Ulysses" (more correctly "Ulixes") is the Latin form of the Greek "Odysseus", source of the word "odyssey".
  6. ^ Hughes, 197.
  7. ^ Hughes.
  8. ^ Quoted in Tennyson, A. T., & Roberts, A. (2000), 567.
  9. ^ Hughes, 199.
  10. ^ Quoted in Hughes, 195.
  11. ^ Stanford, 202.
  12. ^ Stanford, 202.
  13. ^ Pettigrew, 31.
  14. ^ Rowlinson (1994), 241.
  15. ^ Schwarz, 39.
  16. ^ IV, iv. 32 ff., quoted in Bush, Douglas (Jan 1943). "Tennyson's 'Ulysses' and 'Hamlet'." The Modern Language Review, 38(1), 38.
  17. ^ Troilus and Cressida, Act III, Scene III, quoted in Stanford, 203.
  18. ^ Stanford, 204.
  19. ^ Rowlinson (1994), 122.
  20. ^ Hughes.
  21. ^ Campbell, 130.
  22. ^ Hughes, 200.
  23. ^ Hughes, 194.
  24. ^ Baum, P. F. (1948). Tennyson sixty years after. Chapel Hill: Univ. of North Carolina Press. Cited in Hughes (1979).
  25. ^ Hughes, 194.
  26. ^ E. J. Chiasson, "Tennyson's 'Ulysses'—A Re-Interpretation". In Killham (1960), 164–173.
  27. ^ Hughes, 201.
  28. ^ Pettigrew, 41.
  29. ^ T. S. Eliot, "In Memoriam". In Killham (1960), 210.
  30. ^ Tucker, 11.
  31. ^ Quoted in Storch, 282.
  32. ^ Quoted in Storch, 283.
  33. ^ Rowlinson (1992).
  34. ^ Rowlinson (1992), 268.
  35. ^ Pettigrew, 27.
  36. ^ Quoted in Storch, 283.
  37. ^ Robson, W. W. (1960). "The Dilemma of Tennyson", in Critical Essays on the Poetry of Tennyson, ed. John Killham, p. 159. Quoted in Pettigrew (1963).
  38. ^ T. S. Eliot (1950). Selected essays, 1917-1932. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 210. ISBN 0151803870.
  39. ^ Fulweiler, 170.
  40. ^ Stanford, 205.

References

  • Campbell, Matthew (1999). Rhythm & Will in Victorian Poetry. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0521642957.
  • Fulweiler, H. W. (1993). "Here a captive heart busted": studies in the sentimental journey of modern literature. New York: Fordham University Press. ISBN 0823214966.
  • Hughes, Linda K. (1979). "Dramatis and private personae: 'Ulysses' revisited". Victorian Poetry. 17 (3): 192–203.
  • Killham, John (ed.) (1960). Critical essays on the poetry of Tennyson. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. {{cite book}}: |author= has generic name (help) LCC PR5588 .K5
  • Pettigrew, John (1963). "Tennyson's 'Ulysses': a reconciliation of opposites". Victorian Poetry. 1: 27–45.
  • Rowlinson, Matthew (1992). "The Ideological Moment of Tennyson's 'Ulysses'". Victorian Poetry. 30 (3/4): 265–276.
  • Rowlinson, M. C. (1994). Tennyson's fixations: psychoanalysis and the topics of the early poetry. Victorian literature and culture series. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia. ISBN 0813914787.
  • Schwarz, D. R. (1987). Reading Joyce's Ulysses. New York: St. Martin's Press. ISBN 0312664583.
  • Stanford, W. B. (1993) [1955]. The Ulysses theme: a study in the adaptability of a traditional hero. Dallas, TX: Spring Publications. ISBN 0882143557.
  • Storch, R. F. (1971). "The fugitive from the ancestral hearth: Tennyson's 'Ulysses'". Texas Studies in Literature and Language. 13 (2): 281–297.
  • Tennyson, A. T., & Day, A. (1991). Alfred Lord Tennyson: selected poems. Penguin classics. London, England: Penguin Books. ISBN 0140445455.
  • Tennyson, A. T., & Roberts, A. (2000). Alfred Tennyson. The Oxford authors. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0192100165.
  • Tucker, Jr., Herbert F. (1983). "Tennyson and the Measure of Doom". PMLA. 98 (1): 8–20. {{cite journal}}: Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
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